The drowning of the two-year-old son of an African National Congress MP in the communal pool of a Cape Town parliamentary village on Tuesday could have been prevented if safety regulations had been adhered to and the pool's gate latch had not been broken, according to the man who dragged the child's body from the water.
The father, Zunaid Kotwal, a Mpumalanga MP, said on Wednesday he had been in an agricultural and land portfolio committee meeting when he received the news of his son's death.
Mohammed had been at the village in Pelican Park with his mother Ruwaida and brother Hussain, 13.
"I was told that my wife had been busy preparing food to break the fast. My youngest son had gone to the park with one of the neighbour's children. They said that the other child, who is four-years-old, came running down the road and screamed for help, saying that Mohammed had fallen in the pool."
Kotwal said he was unsure of further details, but when he went to investigate the village's pool area he had noticed that the gate which led to the adult's pool was standing open and could not be closed.
The four-year-old's father, Faizel de Vries, who works at the department of agriculture and land affairs at parliament, said he had retrieved Mohammed, who had disappeared beneath the dirty water.
"My child came running, saying that Mohammed was in the pool. When I arrived, the pool was so dirty I could not see to the bottom. When I dived in, I had to use my hands and feet to feel for a body because the water was so filthy."
But when De Vries came to the surface, the boy was already dead.
When the Cape Times visited the scene on Wednesday, the gate had been fixed and the pool cleaned.
The village's caretaker, who identified himself only as a Mr Klaas, confirmed that the gate had been broken "for some time and we fixed it this morning. It can now be closed".
The grounds of all parliamentary villages in the city are the responsibility of the department of public works. The department was unable to comment on the matter on Wednesday.